Rockefeller Foundation hosts release of IWPR report on economic insecurity

2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vicky Lovell ◽  
Claudia Williams
Keyword(s):  
Rockefeller Foundation ◽  
Economic Insecurity

American Insecurity

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam Seth Levine
Keyword(s):  
Political Behavior ◽  
Political Representation ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Political Organization ◽  
Economic Insecurity ◽  
Political Debates ◽  
College Tuition ◽  
New Perspective ◽  
Care Costs ◽  
Politically Active

Americans today face no shortage of threats to their financial well-being, such as job and retirement insecurity, health care costs, and spiraling college tuition. While one might expect that these concerns would motivate people to become more politically engaged on the issues, this often doesn't happen, and the resulting inaction carries consequences for political debates and public policy. Moving beyond previously studied barriers to political organization, this book sheds light on the public's inaction over economic insecurities by showing that the rhetoric surrounding these issues is actually self-undermining. By their nature, the very arguments intended to mobilize individuals—asking them to devote money or time to politics—remind citizens of their economic fears and personal constraints, leading to undermobilization and nonparticipation. The book explains why the set of people who become politically active on financial insecurity issues is therefore quite narrow. When money is needed, only those who care about the issues but are not personally affected become involved. When time is needed, participation is limited to those not personally affected or those who are personally affected but outside of the labor force with time to spare. The latter explains why it is relatively easy to mobilize retirees on topics that reflect personal financial concerns, such as Social Security and Medicare. In general, however, when political representation requires a large group to make their case, economic insecurity threats are uniquely disadvantaged. Scrutinizing the foundations of political behavior, the book offers a new perspective on collective participation.

Ask the Experts

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Sy Uy
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Performing Arts ◽  
Local Community ◽  
Rockefeller Foundation ◽  
Scientific Models ◽  
National Endowment ◽  
Leonard Bernstein ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Western Art ◽  
Personal Connections

From the end of World War II through the U.S. Bicentennial, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Ford Foundation granted close to $300 million (approximately $2.3 billion in 2017 dollars) in the field of music alone. In deciding what to fund, these three grantmaking institutions decided to “ask the experts,” adopting seemingly objective, scientific models of peer review and specialist evaluation. They recruited music composers at elite institutions, professors from prestigious universities, and leaders of performing arts organizations. Among the most influential expert-consultants were Leonard Bernstein, Aaron Copland, Lukas Foss, and Milton Babbitt. The significance was twofold: not only were male, Western art composers put in charge of directing large and unprecedented channels of public and private funds, but also, in doing so, they determined and defined what was meant by artistic excellence. They decided the fate of their peers and shaped the direction of music making in this country. By asking the experts, the grantmaking institutions produced a concentrated and interconnected field of artists and musicians. Officers and directors utilized ostensibly objective financial tools like matching grants and endowments in an attempt to diversify and stabilize applicants’ sources of funding, as well as the number of applicants they funded. Such economics-based strategies, however, relied more on personal connections among the wealthy and elite, rather than local community citizens. Ultimately, this history demonstrates how “expertise” served as an exclusionary form of cultural and social capital that prevented racial minorities and nondominant groups from fully participating.

The 2000s and Beyond

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jayati Ghosh
Keyword(s):  
Structural Change ◽  
International Cooperation ◽  
National Development ◽  
Development Strategies ◽  
Financial Instability ◽  
Economic Insecurity ◽  
Ecological Damage ◽  
The World ◽  
Social Tensions ◽  
Boom And Bust

The decade of the 2000s was a period of boom and bust when, despite rising prosperity in general, there was increased inequality and heightened economic insecurity for most people in the world. The Survey reports tracked both causes and outcomes, taking a broader view of development that emphasized the importance of economic processes and structural change and recognized the effects of macro imbalances and financial instability, as well as the limits posed by ecological damage and social tensions. Several concerns—and possible solutions—outlined in the Survey reports still have major contemporary relevance, including the importance of countries adopting their own national development strategies and the need for international cooperation.

scholarly journals Yellow Fever’s Historical Lessons for COVID-19: International Interventions and Disease Control in Early Twentieth-century Ecuador and Guatemala

2021 ◽  
pp. 0169796X2199848
Author(s):  
David Carey
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Yellow Fever ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Rockefeller Foundation ◽  
Federal State ◽  
Health Campaigns ◽  
Long Term Effects ◽  
Scientific Medicine ◽  
Disease Etiology ◽  
Early Twentieth Century

Throughout tropical urban Latin America, yellow fever wreaked havoc. Located at sea level, Guayaquil (Ecuador) and Puerto Barrios (Guatemala) were particularly susceptible to yellow fever; yet, Ecuadorians and Guatemalans enjoyed significant success in early twentieth-century campaigns against yellow fever. Reflecting international efforts that informed, collaborated with, and at times underwrote Latin American public health campaigns, the Rockefeller Foundation (RF) sent representatives to Guatemala and Ecuador in the mid-1910s to eradicate yellow fever. While those interventions enjoyed immediate success, the long-term effects were more ambiguous. By collaborating with RF, Ecuador had all but eradicated yellow fever by 1919. In Guatemala, however, a few months after RF declared Guatemala free of yellow fever, influenza struck, likely originating from US military camps in Guatemala that RF sought to shield from yellow fever.  Analysis of early twentieth-century yellow fever epidemics and campaigns to arrest them sheds light on COVID-19 pandemic challenges. Even as knowledge of disease etiology was evolving in Ecuador and Guatemala, most leaders accepted or at least did not publicly reject scientific medicine. In contrast, beginning with the most powerful politicians and filtering down throughout federal, state, and municipal authorities, many US leaders rejected science crucial to the campaigns against COVID-19. Similarly, in a pattern that resonates with US residents rejecting precautionary measures against COVID-19 such as wearing masks and maintaining social distance, compliance with anti-yellow fever campaigns was not always forthcoming.

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